The rapid growth of the Internet and personal computing capabilities has impacted virtually every aspect of business and social activities. Among those activities most significantly affected is investing; that is, the buying and selling of stocks, bonds and other assets. Today's investors are able to access (in ways never before possible) information regarding investment opportunities throughout the world. Moreover, in an attempt to satisfy their customers' seemingly insatiable appetites for such information, service providers such as brokerage houses, investment managers, investment find managers, etc. have installed and are operating Internet-based communication tools (such as web sites, etc.) to allow those customers 24-hour a day access to that information.
Yet, despite global access to the vast information provided by Internet-based broker, investment fund and investor service provider systems (hereinafter “broker systems”), from the so-called “value investor's” viewpoint that information is generally lacking an important quality and perspective, relating to the “fair valuation” of those investments. Unlike their “day trader” or “momentum investor” counterparts (who seem to be primarily interested in shorter and medium-term price impacting information like breaking news, current price comparisons, changes in short-term forecasts and economic indicators, and historically focused statistics), “value investors” often also seek information regarding the longer-term characteristics of investment opportunities (stocks, bonds, properties, etc.). Among the most important pieces of information desired by such investors is an estimate of an asset's “fair value”; which is a measure of the asset's intrinsic longer-term worth; and which can be compared to its present price to better understand whether an asset might be currently undervalued or overvalued.
Most value investors are interested in both determining an asset's “fair value” and comparing it to the value of other assets, so they can more effectively choose between alternative investments. Such asset values depend on many factors, including of course the expected time that the investor intends to hold the asset before selling it. For “day traders” and “momentum investors” that time period can be as little as a few hours or months, but for “value investors” that time period can be much more significant. Existing shorter-term analyst opinions and earnings forecasts, breaking news, price trend charts and statistical comparisons, financial reports, and research reports (which are often provided in abundance by conventional brokerage systems), satisfy the needs of most “day traders” and “momentum investors”, but are primarily just a starting point for the analyses of value investors. Where a broker system today does attempt to provide information on the fair value of a stock or other asset, that information primarily tends to be either: limited and very basic; a value grade which is usually derived quite judgmentally (e.g., “B+”); a statistic whose computation is not easily understandable, explained or documented; or produced by rare, cumbersome to use and understand, single asset investment valuation tools. This environment makes it quite laborious for value investors to understand the under/over valuation position of stocks, bonds, properties, portfolios and other investments, thus making it much more difficult for those investors to analyze, evaluate and manage their portfolios.
Accordingly, there is a need for systems that will allow investors interested in valuation oriented information to more easily and interactively query, analyze, and evaluate the valuation of securities, properties and other assets in a manner that can more effectively reflect their personal investment goals and profiles.